Judgment Day. Whether this conjures up images of a massive courtroom, harps and fire, or Ahnold saying “Hasta la vista, baby” to a morphing metal T-1000, the concept carries with it an ominous tone of finality. Ironically enough, virtually every Christian interpretation of Judgment Day involves Jesus saying “Hasta la vista” in both promising his return and his ultimate triumph over evil. But beyond that, many common assumptions by Christians and non-Christians alike about such judgment create inconsistency and confusion. For example, it’s often assumed Christians go to heaven and non-Christians go to hell when they die, but are they then judged twice, once then and once on judgment day? What is the purpose of judgment day then? Why do many people believe our salvation and our rewards/punishments for our deeds are judged at different times when this doesn’t make any sense and when the Bible repeatedly depicts only one day of judgment that clearly assesses both? But if there is only one day of judgment, where do people go after death until this judgment lands them in heaven or hell? Chapter 14 of Healing Hereafter is devoted to simply and biblically demystifying judgement day in a way that makes satisfying sense! Get a taste with the chapter summary below…
Chapter 14
We’ve previously concluded that Hell and Heaven are currently uninhabited by humans. As this partly arises from the unequivocal biblical teaching of a single, future judgment day for all humans, we ask why God waits until then to allow humans into their eternal destinations. The inseparability of final human judgment with the rather unique events of the apocalypse is one adequate explanation, but we also find that the Bible reveals that neither Hell/Gehenna nor Heaven/the New Earth are even available yet for human habitation! However, since the current heaven conceivably could be, we peruse various ways people have tried to reconcile humans having already been judged worthy of this heaven with a last day of judgment still to come. Multiple judgment days with multiple purposes for multiple different groups of people are the only possible options, and we confidently conclude that the amount of unwarranted speculation, biblical partiality, logical inconsistency, practical problems, and resulting widespread disagreement about these judgment days invalidates their existences, especially compared to the sublimely simple, single, universal, final, and biblical day of judgment.
